Safety

Extremely low concentrations of SkQ1 have shown pharmacological effect in our experiments. Such low-dose effect of SkQ1 can be attributed to two important properties of the compound:

high effectiveness in targeting mitochondria and

being a “recyclable antioxidant”.

SkQ1 being able to target the inner leaflet of the inner mitochondrial membrane with high precision is why only very low amounts of the compound are needed in order to affect the cell at the first place. But our experiments also showed that once inside mitochondria, SkQ1, which is oxidized upon interaction with radicals, is effectively regenerated by the respiratory chain. This valuable property provides SkQ1 with an ability to act on a cell for an extended period of time in low doses.

The combination of highly targeted action and being able to achieve effect in extremely low concentrations are probably the major reason why SkQ1 has not shown any adverse effects in therapeutic doses we have been studying in our pre-clinical and clinical experiments.